He has spent the last 56 years around the game as a player, coach, scout and all-around good guy. Now the former Astros coach is working for the Skeeters in a role that’s part adviser, part ambassador.

“You’re entered in a potato-sack race,” he tells me. “How about it? You and me.”

Houston hasn’t had a minor league baseball team in 50 years, and the gamble for the Skeeters is trying to survive in the shadow of a major league franchise.

And then O’Brien starts rattling off reasons people will enjoy the ballpark experience.

“At times, we’ll feel like dinner theater,” he said. “It’s a place to eat, have fun and socialize with your neighbors.”

If the Skeeters are a success, there likely will be more teams added within two or three years. Baytown has been mentioned for a franchise. So have The Woodlands, Conroe and Waco.

Minor league baseball has grown so rapidly and developed such a loyal following at the grass-roots level that anything is possible.

When the good citizens of Sugar Land decided to build a minor league stadium, their hope was it would be an Astros minor league affiliate. Astros owner Drayton McLane rejected the idea, saying a team so close to Minute Maid Park would hurt his attendance.

Since McLane has veto power over any team affiliated with the 30 major league clubs, Sugar Land was forced to go for an independent league franchise.

Players young and old

Now about the baseball. The Skeeters will play in the nine-team Atlantic League, which isn’t affiliated with Major League Baseball. It’s composed of players trying to catch on with a big league team — players on the way up or the way down.

There will be 22-year-old players, and there probably will be 42-year-olds. In recent years, Jose Lima, Rickey Henderson and Ruben Sierra played in the Atlantic League. Former Astros first baseman Mike Lamb is with the Camden (N.J.) Riversharks this season. The top players make $3,000 a month.

“It’s good baseball,” Jones said. “It’s not a stretch to say the position players are Triple-A caliber. The pitching probably is Double-A. People who appreciate baseball will enjoy it.”

Peter Kirk, who owns a string of Atlantic League teams up and down the Eastern seaboard, saw Texas as a potential growth area.

Intimate setting

“You take a baseball game and then you build entertainment,” O’Brien said. “We need to do Sugar Land perfect.

“If Sugar Land is great, that’s how Western expansion will be fueled. We have to show we’ll do what we say we’ll do in our relationships with the city, with our fans, with our business stakeholders. I think our expansion will be based on how well we do here.”

O’Brien’s offices are abuzz with people preparing for opening day 2012 at the 8,000-seat ballpark now under construction. So far, approximately 1,100 of the $550 season tickets have been sold.

There will be all the bells and whistles of minor league baseball. One section of the outfield will be a playground, another an old-fashioned Texas icehouse.

Tickets will go for $8, and $1.75 will get you a hot dog. Depending on your taste in beer, a cold one will cost between $4 and $6.

“There are 24 rows in the seating bowl,” O’Brien said. “The worst seat you can get would be a premium seat at a big league park. You get to see and hear things. You feel the game.”

But the game is only part of the show. When O’Brien ran the Atlantic League franchise in York, Pa., he held a “Dinner with an Oriole” promotion in which fans bought tickets to sit at a large table and hear a former Orioles player — Brooks Robinson, Boog Powell and others — answer questions and tell stories.

“I can see doing that here with former Astros,” O’Brien said.

“You’re going to see a different show every night,” he said. “My wife goes to a lot of games. I can’t tell you she has watched an inning of the baseball, but she loves to meet people. It’s a great environment for that.”

Heck of a bus ride

Until there’s expansion, the nearest Atlantic League franchise will be in Virginia, making for some long road trips.

“We’ll do something like go east and play two or three teams, then come home for 10 days or so,” O’Brien said. “It’s like TCU playing in the Big East. We don’t really know what it’ll be like until we actually do it.”

There’s plenty to do between now and then. The Skeeters have four full-time employees and expect to add 20 more by the end of the year.

“You’ll have a great night at the ballpark,” Jones said, “and you’ll be home in your pajamas a half-hour after the game. What’s not to like?”